It might still be winter but there’s plenty you can do in and around the garden, such as preparing to grow your own veg, keeping wild birds well fed and storing rain water.   Start planning Now’s the time to begin planning what you want to plant this year, where you’ll plant them and buying any seeds you may need. Remember to rotate your crops to avoid removing all of the nutrients from the soil. The BBC have a good, easy to follow guide on plot rotation. If you haven’t got much soil space in your garden, planting bags are a great solution that allow you to grow vegetables on your patio, balcony or roof terrace.   Begin sowing some seeds There are some seeds you can begin sowing in February, but it’s best to keep them under cover or in a greenhouse as we’re still seeing frost and may yet see the dreaded ‘s’ word, snow! Vegetables you can begin sowing in February include: lettuce, carrots, radish, rocket, spinach, salad onions and turnips.   Water butt There’s no real sign of all of this rain letting up yet, so make the best of it by using a water butt to store rain water you can use later in the year on your plants and vegetables. It’s estimated that if everything household in the UK had a standard water butt (between 100 litres and 300 litres), it would save roughly 30,000 million litres of water every summer! We offer water butts in three standard sizes and sell accessories such as stands, taps and connector pipes to help you get started.   Wild birds Continue helping wild birds by providing them with nesting boxes, water and food.   Home composting The great thing about composting is you can start it at any time of the year. Composting allows you to get rid of some of your food and paper waste, grass cuttings and prunings to produce something you can use in your garden next spring. If you haven’t got a compost bin yet, take a look at our range of compost bins made from 100% recycled material.   Recycling Using compostable & biodegradable liners is another thing that can be done all year round. Visit our Councils page to find out whether your council is running a food waste scheme and which size liners and caddies you need.